Just Some Sweets For The Road
by KarrineGenesis
Summary: -I just... I don't want to disappear without living the life I wanna live.- Lance Sweets has secrets. Small ones, big ones, and the one he ends up telling Hodgins in the bathroom about. The one that shouldn't be still happening. Never should be. Warnings: Child Abuse, domestic abuse, non con, violence, angst. Brings back Zack/Zach Addy.
1. Afraid

**AU: No Daisy, Different past, 24 years old, no adoption or foster parents his bio parents didn't die,** **Vincent** **Nigel-Murray** **will** **not** **die. No one left for a year.**

**Set in Season 6.**

Lance Sweets had a past, and present.

He didn't talk about it to anyone.

And he knew it was a bad idea, really, he WAS a therapist.

But he found it was harder than he thought.

If they thought he was going to talk about the scars and wounds hidden from view on his legs and stomach and arms, they were crazy.

But of course, the team, all of them, were going to the pool, and they wanted him to come.

And of course he couldn't come in a suit or even a short sleeved shirt and long pants, though his arms would alert them anyways. Oh no...

*Real Story*

Lance was eating at Temperance's and Booth's favorite little restaurant when Hodgins and Angela came in.

It was morning. Sweets smiled at them. "How are you?" He asked, his cheerful mask on high, but inside he cringed.

He wanted to be left alone.

Angela started, "Good. Uh, we're all going to a swimming pool tomorrow since it'll be Saturday, and we'll be off of work, and we were wondering if you'd like to come."

Sweets felt his facade start to crumble, and his smile faltered. "The pool? As in... Swimming trunks and chlorine and people and swimming trunks?"

" You said that twice, but yes." Hodgins said this time.

Sweets smile was fully gone and he looked sick.

"I-I have to g-go." He stumbled to the boys' bathroom and as soon as he got to the first stall he hurled all of his breakfast into the toilet.

The door opened after.

"Hey man, you ok?" Hodgins asked.

The young guy in front of him took a shaky breath.

"It's only been 6 years." He stopped, then closed his eyes.

Hodgins blinked. "Since?"

Sweets looked into his eyes and Hodgins saw the pain and fear in his eyes. "Since I should have left."

Sweets stood on shaky legs, and almost tipped over, until Hodgins reached out and grabbed his upper arm to keep Sweets standing.

"What do you mean?" Sweets looked down, then weakly tried to wiggle out of his grasp.

Hodgins let go.

Sweets started to take of his shirt.

"What are you- oh my god." Hodgins whispered the last 3 words in disbelief.

Sweets' shirt was off and there were scars and almost fresh wounds all over his arms, chest, and stomach. "I can't leave them."

He took the right lip of his pants at his hip and pulled it down slightly. There was a scar, congruent with someone taking a knife and taking a chunk out. "I've tried. It's a 6 year old scar."

"Who hurt you like this?" Hodgins asked, voice hard.

Sweets pulled the side of his pants back up and looked away, biting his lip and close to tears.

"Who, Lance? Please, tell me who." Hodgins pleaded.

"Remember how I said I still live with my parents?"

That's all he needed to say.

All Hodgins needed to understand who hurt him.

And all Hodgins needed for a reason to hug the younger doctor.

Then he noticed month old welts and whip marks on his back.

Hodgins let him go and turned him around to get a better look.

"No, H-Hodgins..." Sweets protested weakly. Jack ran a soft hand over the raised welts. "They whipped you." Jack stated, whispering.

Lance shuddered.

"They... Whipped... You... Their child..." Jack stopped running his hand over Lance's back.

"They-WE... Used to own a farm."

Jack's hands flew over his mouth as he gasped.

"They used a cattle whip." Jack was still whispering.

Lance was close to tears again as he nodded, eyes closed. "We have to tell Angela."

Lance's eyes snapped open.

"No..."

"We have to tell Booth and Brennan!"

"No."

"We have to tell-"

"NO!" Lance's loud voice cut Jack off.

He closed his mouth as Lance turned to him.

"It'll just make it worse." He was scared, and he stared at Jack with watery eyes.

"They might hurt you. I'm not allowed to be happy. That's why I never went after Daisy."

Hodgins didn't know what to say. "Where's your newest wound?" Lance knew what he really meant was, 'Show me where they hurt you last.'

He took his pants and pulled them down.

There was even more scars on his legs, but what stood out was white gauze. "It happened yesterday." He took the gauze off his thigh and Hodgins stared, wanting to cry so badly.

There were lines of dried blood, where glass had been before he dug it out. There were even fresher whip marks, from yesterday, as he said. They were worse and covering the front and back of both of his legs.

"Do they...?" Jack didn't really have to ask.

"Rape me? On a daily basis, or at least every other day." Tears were were springing out of his eyes as he put back on his pants, shirt, and gauze.

Not in that order, of course.

"At least Angela." Jack pleaded. Lance hesitated. "Not here."

Jack looked relieved. "At my house- tonight. We'll make you dinner. I'll let you tell her."

Sweets nodded, going to the door.

"And Hodgins."

Jack looked up, and Sweets bit his lip.

"Thank you." Sweets left the bathroom, and Jack followed a few seconds after.

"What was that? You've been in there almost an hour." Angela said, then added, "Is he ok?"

Jack shook his head, staring at the door. "He's coming over tonight for dinner. He has something to tell you."

*Later, at the Jeffersonian*

"This victim has broken philanges congruent with someone taking their hand and crushing it in his or her hand."

Temperance Brennan, genius anthropologist, stared at the newest victim of murder she was given.

Hodgins came in, trudging in with no happiness whatsoever. Brennan looked up.

"Hodgins, are you ok?" Booth walked up at that point, but Jack didn't notice.

"Why don't you ask Lance that?" He was angry, but they could tell it wasn't towards Brennan.

"Is he ok?" Booth asked.

Jack looked to him. "No." He said quietly. "And I don't think I'm ok, either."

He took a shaky breath and went to his bug lab.

Booth looked into Brennan's eyes. There was something seriously wrong. With their mutual agreement, they both nodded and went into Hodgins' lab.

"What's wrong with Dr. Sweets?" Brennan asked.

Jack looked up with lazy blue eyes.

"It's so horrifying."

They blinked.

"What is?" Booth asked.

Jack shook his head. Seeley gritted his teeth. "What. Is?" He asked, voice hard.

"I promised... He-He was so scared, that if anyone else found out, the chance of someone getting hurt got higher..." He took a shaky breath.

"Come to my house. Tonight. Hide while he tell Ange. I can't let this happen anymore." Jack closed his eyes.

"Why can't you tell us?" Jack looked up at Booth. "You need to see for yourself."

He looked to Brennan now. "Like I did."

*Hodgins house, dinner*

Lance stood nervously at Hodgins' door, hand raised to knock.

His eye was swollen shut, one of his newest wounds.

Was he really going to tell Angela? He already said he would.

Oh, well, technically he didn't. He just said not at the diner.

But he wasn't going to play that card.

He knocked, and Angela answered.

"Oh, god, Sweets, what happened to your eye?" Angela reached up and Sweets turned away.

She stopped and let her hand drop.

Booth and Brennan watched and listened from a van near the big house.

It took awhile for Angela to agree and get bugs, the audio/video camera kind- on her person, but she saw how badly Hodgins thought this was needed, and she relented.

She would soon see why.

"Come on in." Angela moved out of the way.

Other than the bugs on Angela, there was some everywhere in the living room.

"I got all the workers to lea-" Hodgins stopped and stared at his eye.

"-ve. Wh-what happened?"

Sweets looked down. "Must've slipped and fell, clumsy me."

Hodgins knew he was lying, and so did everyone else.

"That was a lie!" Brennan stated, and Booth sighed. All he knew was that his eye had something to do with his secret. "I know, Bones. We all do."

Sweets looked at Hodgins.

"Go on." Jack coaxed lightly. "It's ok."

Sweets nodded, and started to take off his shirt.

"Sweets..." Angela whispered in disbelief.

Booth and Brennan gasped at the scars and wounds all over his upper body.

Jack was crying when he saw fresh whip marks on his chest.

Sweets hooked the right side of his pants and pulled it down slightly to show the scar.

"Show her the rest." Jack whispered.

Sweets took a deep breath and pulled his pants down, only in his boxers.

There were fresh hand marks all over his legs, already bruising, and already turning yellow at the edges.

The whip marks were still there, and there was one that made them all cry.

The whip mark was the worst because they repeatedly hit that one over and over, they criss crossed the whip over it, coming from his thigh to his stomach.

Under it was a scar, a word that had been carved into his skin: whore.

That's when they noticed the rest of them.

Insults and a name: Emily.

"Who's Emily?" Booth asked, coming in with Brennan.

Sweets gasped and pulled his pants up, grabbing his shirt.

"Wh- h-... Booth? Why are you- D-Dr. Brennan?!"

He took a step back and hit Hodgins. He cried out in pain and closed his eyes, biting his lip in an attempt to calm himself down.

"Sweets, are you ok?" Brennan asked.

His eyes snapped open.

"No. Why...?"

Brennan answered the unspoken question, though Jack shook his head no.

"Hodgins told us to watch with cameras so we can save you." Sweets turned to Jack.

"J-Jack? You betrayed me like that?"

Hodgins shook his head.

"I was trying to save you from your parents." He said softly.

Lance winced. "No, y-you... You just..." He looked at all of them in fear. "I-I gotta go."

Booth shook his head. "No, Sweets, wait-!"

But Lance was already out the door.

And then came his screaming, sending a chill down all of their spines.

They ran out and watched in horror, only 1 or 2 blocks away, 3 men beating on Lance.

They couldn't move.

But once one of them took his belt off they rushed forward, but they knew they weren't going to make it in time.

The buckle glinted in the streetlight.

And then it came down.


	2. Scared

They knew they were to late once they started to move.

The first hit made a loud thump and a sharp slap as Lance Sweets, young psychologist for the FBI made his first full blown scream, and it made the others, the ones that loved him, falter slightly.

But they kept running.

They didn't have time to wonder how the man managed to both whip and beat the poor boy under him at the same time.

The second one came in rapid succession, coming down harder, making Lance scream louder.

It made them slightly falter again, but before the man, maybe 4 or 5 years older than Lance, could hit a 3rd time, Booth had the man's hands cuffed behind him.

The other 2 ran off.

"Seems your friends weren't very loyal." Booth said, deathly quiet and dark.

"Why am I getting arrested? It's just Lance!" That ran the others blood cold, and Booth tightened the cuffs, making the man wince.

"He works with the FBI. That's assaulting a federal officer. How long is that? 6 months in a federal prison. Not to mention Battery, and I'm willing to bet that it's also abuse as a child, and as an adult."

Something flashed in his face.

"How did you-?"

"I saw the scars."

Brennan was already on the phone and getting a fed to take the man to the FBI.

Hodgins was getting an ambulance there.

The Fed car came first.

They took the man away, and a young agent looked sadly at the young Psychologist that Angela, Brennan, and Hodgins were trying to carry to the house.

"Dr. Sweets..." She whispered, than bent to help pick up him to.

Booth did to.

She winced when she noticed one of his legs was broken. She put her arms under his legs instead of grabbing them.

They set him on Jack's couch.

She saluted and turned.

"Thank you, Ms. Sayam." Brennan said, and she turned back. "Don't mention it. And... It's Ann."

The blonde scurried off.

Angela ran a hand through Sweets' hair.

"I'm so sorry, sweetie..." She whispered, kissing the younger man's forehead.

Lance felt her, but he couldn't move.

Couldn't speak.

It was all dark and he could hear but he couldn't respond.

The ambulance got there soon after.

"Alright, let's see." The doctor called some nurses to get him into the ambulance.

"Who's riding with him?" They all raised their hands.

She hesitated. "There... There isn't... Much room..." But they were determined, and this broke the doctor's heart, so she let them. Except, she said one of them needed to use a car so that they can all go home, with or without Sweets.

Angela said she'd drive the car, and took Hodgin's car to follow. Brennan watched the small man lying on the stark white bed.

He didn't seem to actually fit in the bed. It swallowed Lance whole.

"We're going to have to go to court." Brennan realized out loud.

Hodgins nodded.

"When he gets out of the hospital."

Booth ran a hand through his hair and sighed.

"Haven't you heard that I'm the new cancer, I've never looked better and you can't stand it..." Sweets whisper singing in his sleep.

"Did he just...?" Jack reached out to touch Lance.

He gave a shriek and turned away, curling into a ball.

"This is gospel for the fallen ones, locked away in permanent slumber. Assembling their philosophies from prices of broken memories..." He whimpered and started to claw at the sides of his face.

"You're- you're hurting yourself, Sweets..." Brennan said softly.

"I just want to forget. I can't forget."

Jack inhaled. "Photographic memory. He can't forget anything."

Lance nodded. "S-sorry... For everything... I'm sorry for screaming... For getting you in this mess..." Lance unfurled himself and lay on his back, then looked at them.

"You don't have to be sorry. You never have to be sorry."

Lance looked into Booth's eyes. "But... If I was a better person, a better kid, I wouldn't have been hurt. I would have... I would have been worth something!"

"No!" Brennan cried. Lance's eyes widened and he inched away.

"You are worth something." She continued.

"B-but-!"

"I wouldn't argue with Bones, especially when she's right." Booth said.

Sweets looked away. Tears threatened to spill, but he choked them down.

"If she was right, then why does everyone hate me?"

Before they could answer, he whipped his head to look at them.

"Do you want to know why I was conceived? You don't, but I'll tell you anyway."

He took a deep breath, and said, "My older brother Harry wanted a toy."

He gave something like a grimace, wince, and sneer. "And my brother was one of those kids that shared."

Lance curled back into a ball, facing away from the 3.

When sobs started to wrack his body, Jack put a hand on his shoulder. Lance winced and jerked away.

Jack took his hand off.

"Lance, who was that guy who...was..." Booth couldn't barely say it. "Beating... On you..."

Lance curled up more and said, "Alex, he's my cousin."

He started to fall asleep, but then said, "Why do you guys pretend to care for me?"

That startled them. "We aren't pretending!" Lance winced when Jack yelled this.

Jack winced to. "Sorry." He said quietly.

"Yes, you are part of our family." Brennan said, and Lance turned over quickly, staring at her with wide chocolate eyes.

"Wh-what?!"

He blinked up at her a few times.

"What do you mean?" He asked.

"She means that we care for you. We love you, like you were family." Booth explained.

Lance stared at him now. "B-but that... That doesn't make any sense!"

He was back to clawing at the sides of his face, sitting up.

"Sweets, please, stop..." Jack whispered.

Lance just clawed harder, drawing blood.

"L-Lance...!" Booth stuttered.

That's around the time Brennan seized his hands.

He looked at her, startled, then stared at the blood under his fingernails.

"Wh-what...?"

He stared lazily, confused, at the blood.

Then he panicked.

He started to shake.

"No, Lance-!"

He took shaky breaths.

"I'M SORRY!" He yanked his hands out of Brennan's and covered his face, crying.

"Emily!" He cried, biting his lip and drawing more blood.

"Please, stop..." Brennan said.

Than he calmed down, wiping his mouth and getting blood all over his hand.

He didn't seem to notice.

He ran the non bloody hand through her hair.

"I really am sorry... For going all... I usually take work off whenever I get like this. Or at least a few hours." He took a shaky breath.

"I think... I think I should get to sleep." He laid back, closing his eyes.

"Your regular decorated emergency, the bruises and contusions will remind me what you did when you wake. You've earned your place on the ICU's hall of fame, the camera caught you causing a commotion on the gurney again." He fell asleep.

"I think... I think his psyche is... A little... Um..." Jack didn't finish, and they understood.

"Yeah..." Booth reached out, but decided against it.

"He can't heal until we get his parents behind bars, all of his family behind bars." Brennan said, staring at the boy again.

For he really was a boy.

A boy they were going to fix.

*At the Hospital after the call Cam*

"Really? Abuse?" Cam asked, outside of the room with Lance inside.

Jack nodded.

Then there was a gunshot, and 2 screams overlapping each other.

Angela and Lance.

The 2 rushed in and saw Lance, deathly pale, blood spilling from his side.

Angela blinked at him in shock, and so did Booth, Brennan, Cam, and Jack.

Lance took a shaky breath, and Booth yelled for a doctor.


	3. Blood

*1 and a half months later*

When Zack first heard his psychologist, the one he had developed a crush on, no, a LOVE for, had been abused all his life, he had punched a whole in the asylum wall.

A week ago, when they had put him on a polygraph and found out that he hadn't killed the lobbyist, and that he had been blackmailed, he got himself an apartment, and got the hell out of dodge, so to speak.

He came to the court in casual clothes.

He came to the court almost back to being reinstated at the Jeffersonian.

After the case, Cam said.

After they got Lance Sweets' 'parents' behind thick, metal bars.

As soon as Zack Addy got to the doors, he got stares.

Stares from Hodgins, Angela, Booth, Brennan, and Lance. Cam looked like she had got into something she wished she hadn't.

"I-I'm going to go ahead and go in." She said, turning and getting to the row behind where Lance and the best damn lawyer Brennan could buy, were sitting, which was reserved for the Jeffersonian team.

She knew it was awkward. Really awkward.

The others walked in, and Zack sat near the end in between Jack Hodgins and Camille Saroyan.

Lance sat in front, and Jack gave his shoulder a reassuring squeeze.

He turned and gave the team a shaky smile.

His leg was just about fully functional, and his bullet wound, which was still being looked into, was stitched up and as good as he could be in this situation.

Zack sighed slightly, wanting to cry at the brokenness in the psychologist's eyes.

Lance turned back. "Just answer their questions, alright? Don't say anything unless you are asked." The lawyer, Josh Fargood, looked into Lance's eyes, and the younger man nodded.

"All rise!" The ballif cried as the Judge walked in.

Lance fumbled slightly with the crutches he was still forced to use, just in case his leg wasn't still in trouble, and stood.

"You may be seated." The judge called.

Lance sat, thankfully.

The judge called Lance's 'parents' to put their hands on the bible to say the truth and nothing but the truth.

~"What do you want, Lance? Just tell me what you want!" Booth had pleaded, the others in the room looking at Lance to see what his answer would be.

They were still in the hospital, looking over Lance.

"All I know is... I just... I don't want to disappear without living the life I wanna live."~

Lance was called next, to promise to tell the truth and nothing but the truth.

"What do you charge Melinda Sweets and Grayson Sweets with?" The judge, a slightly pudgy woman, asked Lance.

He looked up.

The others didn't know all that he was going to say.

"Child abuse, Domestic abuse, Child molestation, adult molestation..." He steeled his nerves. "And the murder of Emily Cortesch, my cousin."

There were gasps all around the courtroom.

Noise filled the normally quiet court room.

"Lance..." Zack managed to whisper, the others looking at the frail, young, man who was shaking in his seat.

"Do you have any proof of this?" Lance looked up.

"Of which one?"

"Let's start with the abuse."

Lance looked back, then to his lawyer, then asked, "May I take off my shirt?" The other lawyer started to speak, but the Judge waved a hand.

"I'll allow it."

His scars made everyone gasp.

"I don't know if they were the ones that shot me, but the rest are from almost all of my family. Only except all the people I've never met, and my Aunt May. May was Emily's mom." Lance looked up at the judge.

"Guilty of abuse, at least!" The jurors all yelled.

These were terrible people.

Everyone could tell.

There was going to be another trial, but for now, there were 2 charges that his parents were in for.

*Later*

"Where should he live? Who should he live with?" Brennan asked.

Angela volunteered her and Hodgins' house, Brennan and Booth volunteered their house, Cam volunteered her house, and then Zack said, "He can live with me."

The others stared at him, except Cam.

"He can't live in an asylum."

Zack blinked.

"B-but I live in an APARTMENT." He explained.

"I want to go out to eat." Lance said, coming up to them.

"Karaoke..." He whispered, but Zack got it.

"Well, then let's go to that nice karaoke bar that just opened.

*Karaoke Bar*

"You want to sing?" Booth looked at the fragile psychologist, shocked, and Lance nodded.

When the young man got to the mic, he told the man with the CDs, "Blood by In The Moment."

"I hate you for all the sacrifices you made for me...

I hate you for every time you ever bled for me...

I hate you for the way you smile when you look at me.

I hate you for never taking control of me.

I hate you for always saving me from myself!

I hate you for always choosing me and not someone else!

I hate you for always pulling me back from the edge!

I HATE YOU FOR ALL THE KIND WORDS YOU EVER SAAAIIIID!"

They watched in silence as Lance let his heart out, getting louder and louder until he was practically creaming the elongated Said.

"Blood!

Blood, blood, blood

Pump mud through my veins

Shut your dirty, dirty mouth

I'm not that insane

Blood, blood, blood

Pump mud through my veins

I'm a dirty, dirty boy

I wanna feel sane."(I realize she says I'm not that easy & I want it filthy, not insane and feel sane but those lyrics work better.)

He sang this heavy chorus twice. He was crying as he sang, but he composed himself for the next verse.

"I love you for everything you ever took from me.

I love the way you dominate and you violate me.

I love you for every time you gave up on me.

I love you for the way you look when you lie to me!

I love you for never believing in what I SAY!

I love you for NEVER once GIVING ME MY WAY!

I love you for never delivering me from pain!

I love you for always DRIVING ME INNSSSAAAAAAAANNNE!"

He sang the chorus again, still twice, and composed himself as there was an instrumental part.

"I hate you, I hate you, I love, love!

Blood, blood, blood!

Pump mud through my veins

Shut your dirty, dirty mouth

I'm not that insane

Blood, blood, blood!

Pump mud through my veins

I'm a dirty, dirty boy,

I wanna feel sane."

He sang it again, then said, "I hate you for every time you ever bled for me."

He put the mic back, nodded towards the karaoke man, ignored the shocked, silent stares of his friends, and walked out.

Then he gave a shocked scream and stuck his head back in, pale.

"You gotta see this."


	4. H and M

Sweets stared at the words on his car in shock and dismay.

And fear.

In white, scratchy words that stood out from his black car, it said:

'You shouldn't have told.

-H. and M.'

Lance took heaving breaths.

"Who are H and M?" Zach asked quietly.

"My br-brothers, H-Harr-ry and M-Mar-c-cus..." He stuttered, going numb.

And then came the break, the pure shock that turned his legs to jelly and his stomach into ice cold snakes.

He fell and heaved out all he had eaten and drank.

"Its ok, I got you." Angela rubbed his back when there was nothing left in Lance's stomach and Booth was on the phone.

"I need to get protection for Doctor Lance Sweets."

The next day, Lance was back at the Royal Diner where the whole mess had started.

No one failed to notice Lance's appetite was diminishing.

But while Lance picked at his very unappealing food, he couldn't manage to keep his sigh in.

"What's wrong Sweets?" Brennan asked.

Lance was there with Booth, Brennan, and Zack. They all watched him as he ignored the stares and only kept watching his fork play with his food.

"I... I didn't charge my parents with everything I know they did, you know? I-I feel bad, but most of it that I left out was just petty theft, my father sold drugs on the street, my mother laundered money..."

Lance fought back another sigh and looked nervously at all 3 of them.

"M-Mayb-e another m-urd-der..."

They gaped at him and Booth started. "You left out all that? All that could get them the death penalty!"

"I'm not bringing poor, dead Krissy into this!" Lance's voice rose a few clicks.

So did Booth's.

"Come on! Theft, Drugs, money laundering, 2 murders, Child Abuse, Domestic Violence, Child Molestation, Raping of an Adult!"

Lance looked around in fear as the people's growing interest caused everyone to turn to watch.

Booth's voice rose higher.

"Your parents deserve death penalty for everything they did to you!"

Brennan and Zack both realized why Lance was afraid now.

Everyone who was watching started to murmur about Lance and what he had gone through, and about how Booth had done something terrible as well when everyone saw big, fat tears streak down Lance's face.

Lance gave a heart wrenching sob and bolted out the door.

Now the murmuring crowd scolded Booth.

"You shouldn't out his personal life like that!"

"Hasn't anyone told you you shouldn't yell at someone who's going through that?!"

"And you call yourself his friend."

"I don't doubt it if Dr. Sweets doesn't speak to you ever again!"

That one hurt the worst.

Booth realized that it was probably right. He turned to look at Lance, sitting on the curb, sobbing.

"Bones, Zack, could you go check on Lance?" Booth's voice was barely above a whisper.

"Now you stay quiet?!" Zack yelled, and he gave a glare at Booth before he made his way to Lance. Booth flinched.

Brennan was no better. "Why would you do that?!" She left right after that, and though Booth knew it was a rhetorical question, he answered.

"I don't know."

Outside, the 2 scientists were trying hard to comfort Lance.

"Hey, let's get you to the Jeffersonian so you could see Cam, Angela, Hodgins, Mr. Nigel-Murray, Wendell, Fisher, and the others, ok?"

He gave a shaky breath and nodded.

They helped him up and took Zack's car to the Medico-Legal lab.

Meanwhile, Angela was painting at the Jeffersonian with nothing to do.

She hadn't realized it until she really stared, but it was about Sweets.

A small baby duck was sitting on the floor with blood all over it.

Some of its feathers were plucked, and there were two dark shadows, shapes that scared her.

It was almost like it wasn't her that was painting, but someone else. Maybe it was someone else. She did believe in that stuff, but for some reason she knew not to tell anyone about the painting.

She took it off the canvas, rolled it up, and stuffed it in a backpack that was in her junk.

When Sweets, Zack, and Brennan walked in, Angela was surprised to not see Booth.

"Where's-" Angela started, and Zack cut her off.

"Don't say his name." He said, angered.

Angela's eyes widened.

"What?" She asked, Zack being angry like that was so... unbelievable.

"Agent Booth yelled at Sweets about what his parents did..." Brennan sighed.

"In front of the whole diner."

Angela closed her eyes and sighed.

"The idiot..."

"Who's an idiot?" Hodgins asked, walking up them.

"Agent Booth." Zack spat in his nasally voice.

"What did he do?" Hodgins asked angrily.

"He yelled at Sweets in front of everyone in the diner." Angela said softly.

"He did WHAT?" Hodgins bellowed.

"Oh, he yelled at Sweets in-" Brennan started, but Hodgins cut her off.

"Yes, I know, I heard, I mean, how the hell could he do that?"

Brennan pursed her lips.

"He shouldn't have done that."

Sweets looked up for once and said, "It's not his fault... it's mine."

"No, he shouldn't have yelled at you at all, for whatever reason, and hey, we actually know the reason!" Brennan yelled.

Sweets closed his mouth and looked back down.

"Sorry..." He whispered.


End file.
